Premier
Mabuza says municipal performance is affected by politics
Mpumalanga Premier David Mabuza says
internal political infightings at municipalities are some of the reasons for
poor performance of the municipalities in the province as its leadership
focuses on it instead of delivering the services.
Speaking today [Wednesday, 22 April
2015] at a meeting with the Auditor-General Mr Thembekile Makwethu in White
River, attended by all mayors, members of the executives and heads of
departments from the provincial departments, Premier Mabuza said the
preliminary municipal audit outcomes were not encouraging as they indicated
lack of visible progress in terms of performance.
During the meeting, the Auditor-General
had revealed again that only Steve Tshwete Local Municipality and Ehlanzeni
District Municipality in Mpumalanga that received clean audits in the 2013/2014
financial year, which ends in June.
Mr Makwetu had told the meeting that
only five municipalities [Lekwa, Dipaliseng, Govan Mbeki, Nkangala District,
Mbombela] received unqualified audit outcomes with findings.
Gert Sibande District, Chief Albert
Luthuli, Dr Pixley Ka Isaka Seme, Victor Khanye, Thembisile, Umjindi,
Bushbuckridge, Nkomazi and Dr J S Moroka municipalities received qualified
audit outcomes with findings,
It was only Mkhondo, Emakhazeni, Thaba
Chweu, Emalahleni and Msukaligwa that received the disclaimers.
Bushbuckridge improved from a
disclaimer to a qualified while Lekwa, Dipaliseng and Govan Mbeki moved from
qualified to unqualified audit opinion.
According to the Auditor-General, an
unqualified audit outcome with no findings means that the institution produced
financial statements that are free of material misstatements, and that the
institution reported in a useful and reliable manner on performance as measured
against predetermined development objectives and that it complied with key
legislation.
On the other hand, an unqualified
opinion with findings means that an institution produced financial statement
without misstatements but struggled to align its performance reports to the development
objectives they committed to in their integrated development plan.
Further, the institution must set clear
performance indicators and targets to measure their performance against their
predetermined objectives, report reliably on whether they achieved their
performance targets and determine which legislation they should comply with and
implement the required policies, procedures and controls to ensure compliance
With
a qualified opinion, the institution has the same challenges as those that were
unqualified with findings but, in addition, they could not produce credible and
reliable financial statements. It further means that the municipality has
material misstatements in their financial statements, which could not be
corrected before the financial statements were published.
With
adverse and disclaimer audit opinion, it means the municipality has so many
material misstatements in their financial statements that the auditor-general
disagree with almost all the amounts and disclosures in the financial
statements.
Further,
it means the municipality was unable to provide sufficient supporting
documentation for amounts in the financial statements and achievements reported
in the annual performance report and it did not comply with key legislation
Again the Auditor-General stressed
during the meeting that the root causes for the poor audit outcomes were the
slow response to address the root causes of poor audit outcomes, key positions
not filled or key officials lacking appropriate competencies, and inadequate
consequences for poor performance and transgressions.
The Auditor-General told the meeting
that Emalahleni and Mkhondo local municipalities did not submit annual
performance reports for auditing while Emakhazeni Local Municipality submitted
an annual performance report that was not reliable and useful.
The Auditor-General also took time to
explain the term unauthorized expenditure, as it was widely misinterpreted by
the media. Mr Makwethu said his office was on a campaign to educate especially
the journalists that unauthorized expenditure does not necessarily refer money
spent doing wrong things, but in the main it refers to failure to follow proper
processes such as those of supply chain management.
Frustrated by the preliminary report,
which he described as “demoralizing” the Premier lashed out at the mayors and
their municipal managers for behaving in the manner that they were naïve.
“Instead of going forward we are going
backward, we have made no movement. As seasoned leaders you are quite
acquainted with these issues in your institutions and as mayors you are almost
at the end of your term. These matters have been repeated many times by the
Auditor-General, and yet we are making no progress.
“Some of you could not even meet the
required deadline. You cannot even work within the given deadline and yet you
are in the leadership positions. It is not good for the office of the
Auditor-General to come here and talk about the same issues, they are getting
discouraged about us that we are a wheelbarrow,” said Mabuza.
He said the mayors needed to admit if
they could not do the work and call it a day, as they had nothing to loose
since they were left with few months in office.
“Don’t be afraid to tell us that you
cannot do this work. We can admit ourselves that it’s time to call it a day.
You have travelled this distance and you have got nothing to loose. We have
fought and we have tried to make peace, but the situation is still the same,”
said Mabuza.
He explained that most municipalities lost
focus in doing their work, as they were concentrated on politics.
The Auditor-General later awarded Steve
Tshwete Local Municipality and Ehlanzeni District Municipality with MFMA
trophies for their continued work of achieving clean audits.
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